"I leave you love, hope and the challenge of
developing confidence in one another; I leave you a
thirst for education, respect for the use of power, faith
and racial dignity; I leave you a desire to live
harmoniously with your fellow men and a responsibility to
our young people."

--Almetris
Duren quoted Mary McLeod Bethune in her letter of
resignation advising the University of its obligations to
students.

Mrs. Duren helped
establish the Universitys first minority
recruitment program, Project Info and started the
Innervisions of Blackness Choir. In 1978, she received
the Margaret C. Berry Award for outstanding contributions
to student life at The University of Texas. UT President
Lorene Rogers awarded her the 1979 Presidential Citation
for outstanding service. She received the Distinguished
Service Award from the Southwest Association of College
and University Housing Officers in 1980. Her friends
granted her Texas Exes Life Membership  No. 10710.
She was also presented with a key to the City of Austin.
To this day, "Mama Duren" is given highest
honors and thanks by the generations of students to whom
she served as mentor and friend.

Almetris Duren assembled a sizable archive documenting
the problems and issues faced by Black students at UT
from 1950-1980, crucial decades of change. This is
available to students, faculty, staff, and the general
public, for research at the UT Center for American
History located in SRH Unit 2.

(left)
Students demonstrate in 1969, demanding improvements in
all aspects of student life from the UT administration.

(above) Receiving the
first Nowotny Medals in 1983, given to those who made
outstanding contributions to UT student life, were from
left to right: Almetris Duren, student development
specialist for minority students from 1968-1981; Margaret
Peck, former dean of women, on the staff from 1930-1970;
Jack Holland, former dean of students and dean of men on
the staff from 1937 to 1974; Dorothy Gebauer, former dean
of women, on the staff from 1927-1962; Margaret Berry,
former associate dean of students and associate dean of
women, on the staff from 1962 to 1980, and Helen Flinn,
former associate dean of women on the staff from from
1936 to 1964.

(right) Almetris
Durens book, published in 1979, relates events in
the fight for campus integration from the Heman Sweatt
case to the removal of barriers to Blacks in admissions,
housing, and athletics.